The entangled Arp 107; image: NASA/STScI/ESA
The James Webb Space Telescope has beamed back a sensational Gemini which is grinning at us from the depths of the cosmos. The cosmic smiley face, located in the constellation Leo Minor star 465 million light-years away, comprises two … It is an extraordinary occurrence that offers astronomers a compelling opportunity to investigate both the interaction of these two fickle celestial objects as they keep up the orbital dance.
Unveiling the Cosmic Grin
One of those marvels is the image the James Webb Space Telescope has captured. To the casual observer, the two galaxies, jointly known as Arp 107, seem to be undergoing an intergalactic pas de deux courtesy of a bridge of stars stretching between them.
This bridge is a product of the continuous gravitational tussle between the two galaxies as they keep wending their way in towards each other. The two beady ‘eyes’ are the galactic cores and the white stripe forming the semicircle is the stellar bridge between M51 and its companion.
Astronomers were able to examine this cosmic smiley in fine detail thanks to the powerful infrared instruments aboard the JWST, finding plenty of food for thought about how galaxy mergers happen. The JWST has opened a brand-new window to the universe by observing galaxies, in wavelengths of light that were invisible to Hubble and human eye.
Piecing Together the Mystery of Arp 107
There is a lot to see here in Arp 107, which was originally cataloged by Halton Arp as two large galaxies and a legibly written note saying “poss. For decades, astronomers have studied this pair of galaxies located about 465 million light-years away in the constellation Leo Minor.
That bright star at the centre of the spiral galaxy similar to our Milky Way is an ‘active galactic nucleus’ — a region at the heart of some galaxies that produce enormous amounts of radiation powered by a supermassive black hole. The probable cause of this active nucleus is feeding the merger and interaction between the two galaxies, as the massive black hole gravitationally pulls worldwide material and energy.
The JWST data has started to illuminate more of the history of this cosmic smiley, with star-forming regions in blue dots, dust shown as red blobs which overlay and subtend the intricate details of the bridge of stars connecting two sibling galaxies. Those processes are critical to our understanding of the history and future of the universe, so by looking at this system up close, astronomers can learn a lot about how galaxy evolution and mergers come together in detail.
Conclusion
This very cool cosmic smiley face serves as a reminder of just how great James Webb was designed to be. The complexity of Arp 107, with its swirling coils and tails of stars and gas, belies the violence of the collision process that produced it, but by training JWST on Arp 107 in infrared light, we obtain an intimate view of this galactic tangle; a way to peer behind the curtains at ye stars and gas that didst M.C. Escher into yet another realm… where we can depsnce thy spirals even further! While astronomers will continue to study this phenomenal system and learn even more about the processes that create these unique phenomena in universe.
